A Note of Panic
by nachalainne
Summary: Lestrade decides it's time to knock some sense into Sherlock, who's refusing to eat or sleep while he's on a case.


"Don't be ridiculous, Lestrade," Sherlock answered dismissively. "The case is the only thing that matters. My health, my well being - it's just minutiae and if something as reprehensibly human as digestion slows down my ability to process facts then there's no point to it."

Greg's jaw clenched. He flexed his fingers, trying to ease the tension in his arm, and put aside the overwhelming desire to beat the younger man senseless.

Or, rather - beat some sense into him.

Sherlock was in one of his moods - the kind that only surfaced during a particularly complex case. Greg knew before he brought Sherlock in that it wasn't going to end well, but the boy's insistence on not eating or sleeping was slowly driving him up the bloody wall. Most of the time Greg could convince him to have a bite here and a nap there - just enough to carry Sherlock through a case without ruining his damned method.

But this time he was fucking unrelenting. One double homicide with minimal evidence and he wouldn't touch food; he hadn't closed his eyes since God knows when. He seemed to be feeding off nicotine patches, and Greg was sick of it. He didn't let Sherlock in on these cases so the idiot could put his life in jeopardy trying to solve them.

"That's enough," Greg answered. "Sit down and eat, or I'm pulling you from the fucking case."

Sherlock stared disbelievingly at him.

"I'm serious, Sherlock. I don't bring you in on these so you can act like a bloody child."

The consulting detective offered him an arrogant and patronising smirk. "No, but you enjoy it."

Greg's temper flared.

"You need me. You've admitted it publicly, and you know you can't deny it. That gives me leverage - leverage to make my own decisions, and live by my own judgement, whether you like it or not. I wouldn't bother with the Yard at all if that weren't true, but really - Detective Inspector - it's laughable that you think you have some kind of authority over me."

For someone so impossibly brilliant, Sherlock really should have known better.

A flash of a smile - a very dangerous smile - crossed Greg's mouth. And before Sherlock knew exactly what happened, he found himself flat against the wall, with one arm twisted painfully behind his back. The detective inspector gripped his wrist tightly, pressing him hard against the brick without the slightest hint of remorse.

"It's funny that you think I won't turn you over my knee in a heartbeat, lad," Greg retorted quietly. "And right now, you're coming with me, whether you decide you want to or not."

Sherlock struggled, but Lestrade had dealt with his fair share of wiry criminals during his career. He kept a firm hold on Sherlock's arm as he propelled him down the alley, towards his car. The younger man had a lesson to learn about how his actions affected others - and Greg was secretly delighted to be the one teaching it to him.

Yanking the door to the backseat open, he tossed Sherlock inside. "Child safety locks are on - just so you know. Take a nap while you're stuck back here. It'll be good for you." He slammed the door before Sherlock could answer, and quickly slipped into the driver's seat.

"What the hell are you doing, Lestrade?" Sherlock looked indignant at being manhandled - but as ever (and as Greg suspected it would), his curiosity kept him from fighting to get out of the car.

Greg adjusted the mirror so he could see Sherlock's disgruntled expression. "We're going for a drive."

"Yes, but to where?" Sherlock asked, seething.

"You'll find out eventually." Greg glanced over his shoulder at the consulting detective. "Seriously, though - you might as well sleep. It's gonna be a while."

He wasn't joking.

Sherlock watched London slip away with an angry scowl. Kent, and eventually England itself followed - disappearing as they took the Eurotunnel under the Channel to France. He'd shouted and whined - but as Greg had hoped, he passed out shortly after they arrived in Calais.

A long, blissfully silent drive followed.

When Sherlock finally woke up - grudgingly rubbing at his eyes and regretting not having eaten anything for days - he'd almost forgotten the events that preceded his exceedingly long nap. But the gentle hum of the car, and Greg's voice as he spoke to someone over the phone reminded him of the hellish voyage he was being forced to endure, and his anger at being press-ganged into the adventure.

"Where are we?" he demanded, narrowing his eyes against the sunlight as he glared out the window.

Greg checked the mirror briefly, surprised to see him awake. "I've gotta go, Sally - he's up. But get Iain in on it, if he's got the time. Shouldn't make too much of a difference. We were at a dead end with that evidence until Anderson gets the lab results back."

A tinny, female voice responded from the phone in the cup-holder. "I still can't believe you drove all the bloody way to Switzerland last night. You're an absolute lunatic. Have fun, I guess?"

Greg smiled. "Already am. Back in France now, though. Not really sure where..." He trailed off, glancing at the road signs.

"Valdrôme," Sherlock answered.

"Wherever that is. Anyway, I'll call you later."

"Right. Don't be too reckless." Sally's voice was followed by a small click as she hung up the receiver.

Greg glanced at Sherlock through the rear-view mirror again. "How you feelin'?"

"That was Donovan," he stated matter-of-factly.

Greg snorted. "Yeah, figured I should check in with her since I'm not gonna make it in to work today."

"Because you decided to drive to France in the middle of the night."

"Yeah. Well, Switzerland originally - but they're difficult about speeding..."

Sherlock noticed the scenery slipping past at an alarming rate. "You drove to Switzerland so that you could break the speed limit."

"Yep."

There was a long, still silence.

"Why did you forcibly drag me along?" Sherlock finally asked.

Greg didn't answer for a moment. His eyes were focused on the road, and his left hand rested comfortably on the ever-moving gear shift. "If I stop the car, will you get in the passenger seat and not try and run off like a brat?"

Sherlock stared at him. Trees and steep drops lined the road on either side. There were no houses, no farmland - no sign of people, or civilisation of any kind.

"Sherlock?"

"No, I'm going to bloody leap out and make off into the trees like an escaped animal."

"You might. Never know with you," Greg answered. But despite some misgivings, he gradually eased the car to the side of the road and stepped out to open the back door. Sherlock scrambled out, clinging to the car's frame for support as he slowly regained the use of his legs. "Trees are that way," he added, pointing ahead of them. "And that way." He pointed in the direction they'd come from. "Also on either side, if you were curious."

Sherlock fixed him with a vicious glare.

"Oh, and the passenger door is there." Greg smiled and pointed across the car. "Not sure if you've got that bit stored on your hard-drive."

Sherlock actually paused to calculate how long it would take Mycroft to have a helicopter out to collect him before grudgingly making his way around the car to the passenger's seat. "You never answered me."

"I'm about to," Greg replied, dropping back into the car and fastening his seat belt.

He wasn't entirely sure why, but Sherlock could have sworn he felt a sudden uneasiness in the pit of his stomach. Following Greg's example, he reached for his seat belt. "Show me, you mean."

"I mean..." Greg floored it.

The back wheels whined, catching gravel and spitting it against the underside of the car like angry rain. Smoke from the tires enveloped them, but Sherlock hardly caught a whiff of the acrid smell before Greg's car shot off down the road. They barrelled around a turn so quickly that Sherlock found himself clutching the car door to keep from being flattened against it. Greg seemed utterly unperturbed by the speed.

If anything - he seemed giddy.

Sherlock Holmes was not an easy man to scare. Risking his life and putting himself in danger was routine in his line of work. It rarely phased him to be faced with a perilous situation. Generally, it just got his adrenaline going. But an understanding of physics, coupled with Lestrade's reckless enthusiasm was doing a splendid job of making him wish he'd walked off into the trees.

"Lestrade-" Another sudden turn threw him against the door again.

Greg ignored him, and let his foot sink down on the gas pedal again. Hard out of the corner - never brake if it can be avoided.

This was well beyond reckless. They were in the Alps - where the roads just casually dropped off sixty or more feet with only a thin, rock barrier between them and open air. A single mistake on Greg's part and even the airbags wouldn't be a lick of use in preventing their inevitable, painful death.

And at their current speed, it seemed unlikely that the next hairpin turn was going to end well.

"Lestrade," Sherlock repeated earnestly.

Greg seemed oblivious.

"Oh, for god's sake, Greg!" Was that a note of panic in his voice?

Greg slammed on the brakes. Sherlock jerked forward, the seat belt catching him so hard across the chest that it knocked the air from his lungs. The car screeched to a stop, parallel to the turn and subsequent cliff because of how the back wheels had hydroplaned across loose gravel. Greg was grinning - he hadn't counted on rocks being in the road, but he was mightily pleased with the effect.

Sherlock looked across the length of the car at him, casually ignoring how white his knuckles had gone as he gripped the door."And what exactly was the point of that?"

Greg looked away from the road, meeting his eyes. "The next time you think it's more worthwhile to starve yourself, or to stop sleeping for the sake of some case... remember that it's not just you who suffers, Sherlock. It's me. It's my team. And anyone else along for the ride."


End file.
